Carlo's Great California Road Trip

Are you in Toronto and looking out the window right now? Do you hate the snow? Are you sick of winter? If you answered "yes" to even one of those questions, we've got your medicine. Or we're about to make life worse for you. Take your pick.

A few weeks ago, after the holidays were said and done, one of our family and the co-founder of Drake General Store, Carlo Colacci, decided to put Toronto in his dust and head south, snowbird-style. But this trip didn't take him to Florida, the favourite destination for many Torontonians once the weight of a long winter outweighs the snow itself. Instead, his path veered west somewhere in the middle of the continent, taking him to the Pacific coast. With the words "polar vortex" about as alien as the surface of Mars, he and his wife took the Kerouac road and drove from Los Angeles to San Francisco—the great California road trip.

It was a whirlwind trip, taking Carlo to some of the finest restaurants and cafes on the U.S. West Coast—everywhere from The Griddle Cafe to Bar Tartine to, of course, In-N-Out Burger. Beyond just being a tour of tastes, though, it was also a pilgrimage of sorts, taking in the towering redwoods of California, the other-worldly beauty of Big Sur, and the seaside grandeur of Santa Barbara.

That might be the best thing for you to read on a day like this, with your imagination warming you faster than your winter coat. But if it's the worst, we apologize, and we hope these photos of his trip make it up to you.